Recent Posts

3751

Living Room / Re: Favorite Websites...What are yours?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 12, 2012, 02:13 PM »

Here's a couple new ones from today.

Commentary http://thegrumpyowl.com/  Some interesting takes on emerging modern issues.

The opinions are pleasantly different from some of the other mainstream slants.

Here's some subsidiary links based off Grumpy Owl posts:
http://www.theatlant...elationships/256346/
http://www.youtube.c.../watch?v=_drEFOaPaK8

And I like the snarky edge he puts on some of the issues, which helps counterweight some of the "polished-fake-neutral" spin that a lot of mainstream media likes to report in. (Sidebar: The Simpsons has done a few brilliant parodies of the Newscaster tone and style. Do y'all remember that special cadence most of a certain newscaster generation used? (capitalization special) we bring you LIVE to the UNDERGROUND music scene here in SOUTH WESTCHESTER, conneticut (I made that up) where ATROCIOUS things are happening RIGHT NOW under our NOSES!)

http://thegrumpyowl....h-the-body-electric/
http://thegrumpyowl....ject-fetish-freedom/
http://thegrumpyowl....aiti-a-haunted-land/

3752

Living Room / Re: When you make your 100'th Post

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 12, 2012, 01:55 PM »

This is very far from software, but I just wanted to share with friends here - I got an article published at one of my favourite web sites! The Activist Post!

It is an activist site, so it is highly politically charged, and my article is no exception. It's on water quality and fluoridation. It gets into legislation.

http://www.activistp...ontaminants-and.html

Demonstration of Contaminants and Fluoride in Melbourne, Victoria Water Supply
Ryan Smyth, Contributor
Activist Post

The quality of water coming out of the taps here in Melbourne is simply abysmal. Melbourne Water Corporation, the organization responsible for the water supply, does its best to fool people into thinking that the water is safe and fit for human consumption. The truth couldn’t be further away.

Anyways, I was happy. It's one of my favourite sites, as I posted in Stephen's thread on the topic.

-Renegade (May 12, 2012, 11:51 AM)

I think this is Renegade's 5500th post! (Because the weapons one is after this one.)

Go Renegade! 

3753

Living Room / Re: Cool YouTube feature I just found randomly

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 11, 2012, 09:42 AM »

So it automatically creates custom forum feeds out of ... what? Scraping this site?

3754

General Review Discussion / Re: Quick Review: Collusion - Firefox "tracking" add-on

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 11, 2012, 09:12 AM »

Too bad we can't draw little smiley faces in the diagrams!

3755

General Software Discussion / Re: What purpose does browser-specific blocking serve?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 09, 2012, 07:36 AM »

I'll throw some stuff on all this from another angle.  Y'all are looking at this from a "nice innocent" angle, both on the business side and the developer side. "Let's develop for all the browsers!" "The widest reach possible is best for business".

But what if that's only "Level 1" type strategy? "Build the website for all the browsers and they will come."

What if you *don't* need to develop for all the browsers? This is the exact same argument over Flash on iPads. "The widest reach" is of course to put Flash on iPads. "It's the developer's job to make it work" etc etc.

But Apple made a "Level 2" strategy move not to. They wanted to rearrange the ecosystem.

So here's a snarky Level 2 strategy: Look at it from the Support Side. Maybe you don't want a customer base filled with the type of people who post comments on Youtube.  So anyone who can't read enough to know what the words browser and IE are, isn't going to read anything about your app either! "If you can't download Firefox, you're not worth my time to support on the help desk."

Edit: I'll say it even stronger. "Honest-to-goodness time tracking and invoicing for
browser-based freelancers, consultants..."

You're a *consultant*. This isn't a Zynga Facebook app. It's a tool for *working knowledge advice professionals*. If you as a consultant can't download another browser, then I wouldn't hire you, and if "the CEO did" then put me in a padded room now. I can't even fathom a conversation to a consultant that goes like this:
"Hmm. I can't use this website."
"Oh, that's okay, you have to use a different browser than IE."
"What's a browser? What's IE?"

3756

Living Room / Re: Skype replaces P2P supernodes with Linux boxes hosted by Microsoft

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 08, 2012, 01:55 PM »

This kind of seems like the KKK setting up a hotel for the Black Panthers... 

-Renegade (May 08, 2012, 10:14 AM)

I was thinking of auto workers driving something other than their brand.

3757

Living Room / Re: Software Developers: Solve a puzzle, get an Interview (Facebook)

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 08, 2012, 01:34 PM »

"In one of these languages". Heh pity they specified that, it would be funny if someone wrote a correct answer in Lolcat.

Humor Note for the day: It would be hysterical if some eccentric business owner ran an enterprise system in Lolcat and made it sound like an ordinary programming job. The first 30 seconds when the new hire looks at 40,000 lines of Lolcat code doing something cutting edge would just make him DoubleFacepalm.

-TaoPhoenix (May 08, 2012, 01:24 PM)

30 seconds...to read 40,000 lines of code?

-Stephen66515 (May 08, 2012, 01:31 PM)

No, 30 seconds to *recognize* 40,000 lines of Lolcat and go "Oh.... My ........ Gawd.......... You .... HAVE ... to be kidding me. "
(Remember, the joke works best if this is like the master control for the Human Genome Project, not just one man's hobby.

3758

General Review Discussion / Re: Quick Review: Collusion - Firefox "tracking" add-on

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 08, 2012, 01:30 PM »

Good luck in the cookie labyrinth.

-IainB (May 08, 2012, 10:09 AM)

Well, hmm. First Party ones seem to be a big deal, but then (normally!) first party cookies aren't ad-trackers. 6 hours in to No-3rd party ones, I don't see any ill effects.

3759

Living Room / Re: Software Developers: Solve a puzzle, get an Interview (Facebook)

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 08, 2012, 01:24 PM »

"In one of these languages". Heh pity they specified that, it would be funny if someone wrote a correct answer in Lolcat.

Humor Note for the day: It would be hysterical if some eccentric business owner ran an enterprise system in Lolcat and made it sound like an ordinary programming job. The first 30 seconds when the new hire looks at 40,000 lines of Lolcat code doing something cutting edge would just make him DoubleFacepalm.

3760

General Review Discussion / Re: Quick Review: Collusion - Firefox "tracking" add-on

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 08, 2012, 08:45 AM »

What happens if I set my browser to disallow all cookies period? I know I'll lose "a little functionality" but do y'all expect entire sites to break if they can't set cookies?

-TaoPhoenix (May 02, 2012, 12:26 AM)

Why not try it and see? You will at any rate discover which sites are designed not to work for you unless you let them set/read cookies.

-IainB (May 02, 2012, 08:05 AM)

I had a minute to look at cookie settings today. There's two big categories: "Sites" and "Third-Parties". Turning the Site Cookies off seems to be pretty bad - Gmail yelled at me "You don't have cookies enabled. Sudo turn them back on now." (Paraphrased).

So now I'll see how far I get with the Third Party ones off.

3761

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: FastUnzip Snack

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 08, 2012, 05:41 AM »

Hmm, do you mean convert a folder to RAR?

-c.gingerich (May 07, 2012, 06:15 PM)

No, "UnZipping" (Un-RAR) a folder. Just like unzipping a zip folder right? Except the snack doesn't launch on doubleclicking a rar item.

3762

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: FastUnzip Snack

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 07, 2012, 04:42 PM »

Chris,

I am trying to unconvert a RAR, but even after running the setup with all the associations checked, Fast Snack doesn't find it, and the other program is still the default. Any ideas? (XP)

3763

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: FastUnzip Snack

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 06, 2012, 07:04 PM »

Far from me to know why anything is, but it looks like it's back to working now!

Gingerich Wins... Zipality!

3764

Living Room / Re: Show us the View Outside Your Window

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 06, 2012, 04:18 PM »

I haven't seen the view outside my window in two years! (Well, when I'm at home relaxing that is. I do eventually have to get to work somehow, and I do a couple of day trips.)

/Hermit   

3765

General Software Discussion / Re: Splinter

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 06, 2012, 04:16 PM »

Heh So I put your neato creation away for a while, but you did inspire me to mash a bunch of things into a couple of folders, so that I only have 60 items on my desktop now! 

3766

General Software Discussion / Re: Extension List Dumper (Firefox add-on) - Quick overview.

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 06, 2012, 04:02 PM »

That's a lot of add ons! 

3767

General Software Discussion / Re: Splinter

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 06, 2012, 03:58 PM »

Here's my new question:

With the advent of the touch screens, would Splinter start to almost turn the desktop into a giant iPad? I mean, if there's all these touch points, you just make them 99% transparent, then it's almost like using an iOS app right?

Heh - and I'm seeing fun uses for Star Trek Theme packs! : )

3768

Developer's Corner / Re: Plugins

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 06, 2012, 05:19 AM »

If the application has an interface for plug-ins and the programmer has infinite time, then yes, they can create plug-ins for anything. In reality, the programmer needs something to guide them. Having documentation, API specification, or an example helps. Without them, it is like creating a key without knowing anything about a lock.

-vlastimil (May 06, 2012, 05:13 AM)

So some applications don't have a plugin interface at all?

3769

Living Room / Re: Blog comments - On of off?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 06, 2012, 04:49 AM »

Actually, returning back to that "Potential Commission" web layout app, (which I am now looking elsewhere to do), an awesome experiment would be to have the same text on different web layouts, and watch the types of comments, from flowers to cars to landscapes to ye olde historie, etc.

3770

Developer's Corner / Plugins

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 06, 2012, 04:14 AM »

Can a good programmer create plugins for any application? Can you just hand someone an EXE and say "write a plugin for this" or do they need API's or such?

3771

General Software Discussion / Re: Get the most out of your multi-processor computer

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 06, 2012, 04:11 AM »

I think we're on the edge of a crash in Moore's Law for a bit with the whole Cores thing. I have one of the first Quad Cores, and 6 years later app writers are struggling to make threaded apps. Then let's say you write your app for 4 cores, then next year Intel does an 8 core comp, boom, you're back to wasted comp power again.

Meanwhile we gotta be close to some hard limits on the die shrink side as well, so for once MS might need to prune its code instead of relying on hardware.

Edit:

Does anyone have a utility that shows you all (here, four) cores and separate out the processes by core?  So then you can see an older app using all of one core and none of the other three maybe?

3772

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: starpunch.net

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 05, 2012, 10:58 PM »

Yee ha!

3773

General Software Discussion / Re: Superboyac is throwing in the towel: I'm going to transition to Linux

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 05, 2012, 10:44 PM »

Yeah, I saw the news of that too. "In the future, products have *fewer* features than before!" 

3774

General Software Discussion / Re: Splinter

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 05, 2012, 04:02 PM »

Stay Awesome! I will have to think on that and then see if my feeble powers are up tpo it! : )

3775

General Software Discussion / Re: Splinter

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on May 05, 2012, 03:10 PM »

Sorry, I'm only as sharp as a marble. I'm stuck again. I can't even find any of the triggers anymore. They don't even register anymore.

Can you upload a version of the overlay with two white dots that signal the click points, such that the right trigger only activates if the left does, and then we can select a folder?

Edit: 1280 x 1024 is the preferred resolution if you can do it.